Clemens wrote to Lawrence at 23:56 07 Jun:

 CB> Hello Lawrence !

LG> While I certainly don't mean to malign any Linux code or
LG> programmers, it is new, relatively speaking, and sometimes
LG> it takes several years before some of the more obscure issues
LG> with a product come around to see the light of day.

 CB> Interesting what Ken Thompson, grandfather of *nix has to say about
 CB> Linux' code quality: some of it he likes and some not so much. 

Perhaps a very fair assessment. :-)

LG> Where they differ is in areas such as:

LG>   a. Installation methods
LG>   b. Customer support
LG>   c. Price, packaging, sales channels, and delivery methods.

 CB> For the newbie, I think, FreeBSD's port/package -system is a huge
 CB> advantage. Much nicer than .rpm or .deb! I haven't played with
 CB> Gentoo yet though.

I agree, Clemens. 

LG> The fundamental different between NetBSD and the others, is that
LG> NetBSD's "headquarters" is in Canada, and thus was able to avoid
LG> ALL of the U.S. imposed export restrictions on cryptography.

 CB> Wasn't that OpenBSD?

Uh... I stand corrected. :-)

Yes. NetBSD was the original group, founded to take over development of
386/BSD from Bill Jolitz, and expanded the project to include multiple
platforms. FreeBSD formed shortly thereafter, to focus on development for
the PC architecture. OpenBSD was founded several years later, based in
Canada, and focused on security, easier use, and wider distribution.
OpenBSD achieved this by (1) circumventing U.S. export requirements on
cryptogrphic techniques, and (2) making a CD-based media set available to
the general public at a nominal cost.

---